


cold fingers

by honey_butter



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: F/F, Making Out, and because im gay, because its cold, like caroline and quanyii are still married but its an open relationship ya know, like literally its just 1k of miraline make outs, quanyii is mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:47:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21649291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honey_butter/pseuds/honey_butter
Summary: Queen Mira and Sir Caroline visit the Southern Frosts on a diplomatic mission and, surprise, surprise, it's freezing. Both of them have an idea for how to warm up.
Relationships: Sir Caroline/Queen Mira (Penumbra Podcast)
Kudos: 12





	cold fingers

**Author's Note:**

> so i have almost two feet of snow where i live and it's still snowing, i'm freezing, and i'm also very, very gay and desperately want to smooch my partner. so naturally i write ~1k of miraline making out because of the cold.

Upon re-entering the royal guest room, Caroline felt her shoulders relax and drop, the tension that filled her whenever she visited her homeland slowly draining from her muscles. Queen Mira had been invited to the Southern Frosts on a diplomatic mission, the empress of the tundra deciding that the peace accords The Citadel had signed generations ago were long overdue for a rewrite. Honestly, Caroline shouldn’t have been surprised when Mira chose her to make the trip with her: the Frosts were Caroline’s former home, and she, Mira’s most trusted knight. That didn’t stop her from wishing Mira had taken Angelo or… well, no, not the poet, with her instead.

She used to belong to the Frosts and the memories that accompanied the bite of the cold, the sting of fresh snow were ones she had buried, ones she had hoped to forget. Here, in the Frosts, Caroline had been a different person. She had not been honorable, she had not been strong or brave or loyal. Here, Caroline had not been loved. She wanted to forget the scared little girl that only hit back because, if she didn’t, she wouldn’t have anything left. Caroline didn’t want to be that person anymore.

But she couldn’t say no to Mira (about anything, it was starting to become a problem actually) so she left the warmth of the Citadel and Quanyii’s arms and was now here, in the place she had tried for the past three years to escape, completely freezing. 

Caroline had forgotten just how cold the winters here could get, how even indoors you were frozen. Her metal armor was slowly turning her into a Caroline-shaped ice cube, it was now almost too painfully cold to touch.

“I think that went well, Sir Caroline,” Mira brushed into the room after her, sliding the door shut as she went.

Queen Mira wore five layers of her silk dresses, and, Caroline only knew this because had been there when she put them on, three separate head scarves. Even so, the queen’s fingers were tinged with white, her lips a little bluer than they probably should be.

“Yes, I think it did. My queen, do you require anything of me?” And then, because that sounded a bit too forward, “You look rather cold.”

Mira shook her head, though her hands shook as she began to remove her head scarves for the night. Her frozen fingers fumbled with the first tie and she mumbled out a string of unrecognizable curses.

“Er, my queen?”

Mira sighed and dropped her hands to her sides in frustration, “Yes, fine. Could you please help me with my headscarves?”

“Of course.”

Caroline stepped forward and began to work the ties loose, her fingers were trembling from the cold just slightly but were still steadier than the queen’s. When she moved to lift the headscarf off of her head, the metal of her armor bumped up against Mira’s back.

Mira sucked in a breath and flinched, “What  _ is _ that?!”

Before she could decide not to, Caroline ran her hand over Mira’s head soothingly. “It’s just my armor, I’m sorry.”

“It’s… it’s  _ very _ cold.”

“...Yes.”

Mira turned around and looked up at her, their eyes locking, “Do you want help taking it off?”

Caroline sucked in a breath and maintained eye contact, her eyes searching the steel grey of Mira’s. “...Yes.”

Mira remained looking into her eyes as she began to undo the buttons that held the armor together, hissing as her fingers touched the metal.

“My queen, you don’t have to—”

“No, I don’t. And it’s… it’s Mira to you.”

“Mira.” Caroline savored how the word felt on her lips.

The armor was removed and Caroline could feel the smallest glimmer of heat beginning to fill her chest again, “Thank you.”

Mira’s mouth quirked just enough that Caroline wouldn’t have seen it if they had been further apart, “I still require assistance, Sir Caroline.”

Caroline moved to undo the second headscarf, then the third. As she lifted the final garment off of Mira’s head, freeing her loose, long curls at last, Caroline bit back her anxiety and leaned forward.

Whispering, close enough to Mira’s ear that her lips brushed the skin, Caroline said, “It’s just Caroline.”

“Caroline.” Mira murmured.

Caroline remained where she was, her breath warming Mira’s ear and creating a cloud in front of their faces as she began to thread her fingers through Mira’s hair. Mira gasped slightly, trembling now not just with the cold.

At her gasp, Caroline decided to throw caution to the wind. Ducking down, Caroling pressed an open mouthed kiss to Mira’s neck, her hands still stroking through her hair.

Mira let out a breath that had more substance than her previous gasping and sighing, but which Caroline still wasn’t sure could be called a moan. Her hands moved up to grasp at the shaved fragments of Caroline’s hair, Caroline had to make an effort to not flinch from how cold they were.

Caroline kept kissing Mira’s neck, taking a moment for a brief interlude of biting her earlobe, before pulling away to look at Mira’s face again, panting now. Mira’s cheeks were rosy, both from the cold and from Caroline’s treatment, her eyes sparkling and wide, her lips parted, still tinged that slight shade of blue.

“Mira, your lips look cold.”  _ Saints, that was smooth, _ Caroline congratulated herself.

“I require your assistance in warming them.”  _ Oh… that was smoother. _

Caroline smiled as she leaned in, watching Mira’s eyes shut sweetly in anticipation before she shut her’s. The kiss was long, drawn out by the bitter cold that Caroline so desperately wanted to banish from Mira’s lips. When they parted, Caroline and Mira locked eyes again for a split second before Mira was leaning up into Caroline’s mouth. 

They kissed like this for a while, hands in each other’s hair, mouths just trying to stay warm, before Caroline decided that she’d had enough with that and took a step into Mira, pushing her backwards slightly and that much closer to the bed. At that, Mira pulled them back until her calves knocked against the side of the bed. All it took then was Caroline pushing Mira just the smallest bit before they fell, Mira now pinned beneath Caroline.

Caroline smiled down at her, her hands still in Mira’s hair, before she continued to kiss her. Her mouth, her neck, her hairline, her collarbone, all were fair play in Caroline’s books. She kissed the cold away, kissed color back into her skin, kissed budding bruises into it too.

Mira stopped her with a hand on her cheek, guiding Caroline’s head away from where it had been biting just slightly at the crook of her shoulder. “I fear,” her voice was wobbly, “I fear I must stop you there, Caroline. Or else we may… and we can’t… not here.”

Caroline brushed a stray strand of hair behind her ear, “Of course, Mira.”

“That isn’t to say I don’t  _ want _ that, but—”

“I understand, don’t worry.”

Mira sighed, running her hand one last time through Caroline’s hair, “Would you still wish to share the bed with me?”

“Mira,” was all Caroline said before she was standing up, giving room for Mira to resituate herself and allowing her access to douse the single candle that burned in the room. They didn’t bother to change out of their clothes, it was too cold and would have put all that warming up they did to waste. 

Later, when Mira was asleep and her head cushioned on Caroline’s breast, Caroline decided that she was thankful that Mira had chosen Caroline to accompany her, despite the memories these frosts dredged up. She was thankful that  _ she _ was allowed access to this, to see her queen with her guard dropped and asleep. And, lastly, she was thankful for the cold because it gave her an excuse to hold Mira, to kiss Mira,  _ to love Mira _ .

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!! i'm on tumblr at [labelleofbelfastcity](https://labelleofbelfastcity.tumblr.com/) come and scream at me about the penumbra if you want. or we can lament together about being cold/the homophobia of not being able to smooch our preferred smooch-ee. 
> 
> i didn't edit this _at all_ so if there are any glaring mistakes, please feel free to point them out. 
> 
> anyway, that's all lovelies, see you next time.


End file.
